


Smolder

by Neyiea



Category: Gotham (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Love at First Sight, M/M, Marijuana, Which lbr is what happens in canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-27
Updated: 2020-10-27
Packaged: 2021-03-09 03:01:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,634
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27227752
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Neyiea/pseuds/Neyiea
Summary: Jeremiah would really rathernothang out with Jerome's stoner friends, but he also would rather not be forgotten about and then have to take public transport home.
Relationships: Jeremiah Valeska/Bruce Wayne
Comments: 13
Kudos: 107





	Smolder

Jeremiah slinks behind Jerome on the overgrown path heading into the woods bordering the east side of the campus, frown tugging unsubtly at his mouth. The second that his brother glances behind to look at him Jerome snorts crudely at his expression. 

“You can take public transit home if you don’t want to wait for me.”

As if that was any better than this. Although Jeremiah’s last class of the day had been cancelled the busses going from campus would be packed with students for the next three hours, and Jeremiah hated being stuck in the cramped conditions of a bus filled well-past capacity. He hated it even more than the thought of being driven home by Jerome after his delinquent brother had been smoking. And he wasn’t going to wait in the library for Jerome to finish, because then he’d just end up being forgotten about and he’d have to go home on the bus anyway, because that was exactly what had happened the last time he’d asked for a ride.

“I’ll wait,” Jeremiah grits out. “I just almost can’t believe you smoke and drive.”

“This is a social call, Jeremiah, not a fucking party. I’m not going to total my car after sharing a joint with a few other people. Besides, I’ve got to replenish my stash.”

Jeremiah’s steps become even more slow and shuffling.

“Are you meeting with your _dealer?_ We’re barely off of school property!” And Jeremiah couldn’t afford to get caught associating with a bunch of stoners by campus security, especially if one of them was carrying more than just a couple of grams on them. He had a scholarship, a reputation, _basic dignity._

Jerome darts another glance at him, an amused twist to his lips and a funny glint to his eye before he turns back, ducking under a low branch as the path forks; one way is well-maintained, the other looks overgrown and wild. The second one, of course, is the one that Jerome chooses to trek down. 

“I wouldn’t call him a dealer.”

“He sells you weed, what else could you possibly call him?”

“The greatest friend that I have ever had,” Jerome sing-songs, backtracking so that he can roughly sling an arm around Jeremiah’s shoulders. “Met him here in the woods by accident at the start of the semester and gave him a light because his lighter was out. He promised he’d ‘repay me for my generosity’, which at the time was super fucking weird, but then we met again at a party a few months ago and he _remembered me_ and _gave me_ three grams of some real prime kush. He and a buddy of his have a fucking _hobby_ grow-op and they grow way more than they can smoke, so he sells really cheap to his friends.”

“And then you can upsell anything you don’t smoke to people in your classes,” Jeremiah murmurs, a few of Jerome’s nonessential purchases over the past few months suddenly making sense. “If you get caught you’re going to get expelled.”

“ _If_ , Jeremiah. The ‘if’ is key. Security doesn’t come out here, we smoke off of school property, and frankly there are worse drugs on campus to be dealing out than weed. I’ll be fine.”

Jeremiah’s frown deepens and he tries to imagine what Jerome’s mystery friend looks like; older, long hair, sleepy eyes, possibly terrifying and possibly carrying a weapon. He’s suddenly unsure if spending time here would be better than being on a cramped bus, but it’s unfortunately too late to back out because Jerome must see something ahead beyond the trees and he whistles loudly.

“You’d better not be whistling at me,” a girl’s voice, sharp and reprimanding, cuts through the branches, and Jerome laughs at it.

“Obviously I’m whistling at Bruce, Selina.” He withdraws his arms from around Jeremiah’s shoulders and strides forward, picking up speed and rushing into a small clearing. Jeremiah pauses, wavering, as he watches Jerome and Selina bump shoulders companionably. “Happy to see you too, though. Ivy’s not here today?”

“She’s really into growing a new strain right now,” a new voice pipes up, and Jeremiah squints through the branches to try and make out who’s speaking. Their back is to him, and all he can see is a dark coat and dark hair. “Sativa dominant, we want to call it ‘Exam Prep’. Her first batch is just starting to flower and she’s practically sleeping over every night, she’s so excited about it.”

Jerome laughs as he turns towards the new speaker, Bruce, who must be the friend he’d spoken about. Jeremiah watches his brother advance, a hand reaching out to roughly ruffle dark hair.

“ _Exam Prep_ , the two of you crack me up.”

“I could tell,” Bruce responds dryly, though he doesn’t bat Jerome’s hand away. He doesn’t sound intimidating, and he doesn’t look particularly scary from behind, so Jeremiah doesn’t feel too weird about stumbling through the tree line into the clearing even though he _still_ really doesn’t want to be here.

Selina turns to glance at him first, raising an eyebrow and saying, “I thought you were lying about the twin thing to seem more interesting.” Which Jerome chortles at, and then Bruce turns to look at him, and he’s—

Cute. He’s so fucking cute. Jeremiah almost does a double take, because he had not been expecting a _cute pot dealer_.

“Hey, Jeremiah, right?”

Jeremiah nods, trying not to openly stare as Bruce casually approaches him and clasps a hand on Jeremiah’s upper arm like they’re already good friends. Usually he’d pull a face or smack a stranger’s hand away if they touched him, but this was… Tolerable. 

“I’m Bruce,” he introduces, dark eyes sparking with something like happiness. Jeremiah feels immediately swept away by him. “It’s nice to meet you at last! Jerome talks about you all the time.”

“I do not!”

Bruce glances over his shoulder, flashing Jerome a look that Jeremiah can’t make out, and then he leans in a little closer to whisper, “He does. He’s really proud of you, even though he probably never tells you.”

“Whatever Bruce is saying is lies, terrible lies,” Jerome calls, though he mostly seems unbothered as he and Selina group up on the other side of the clearing. Bruce withdraws, his hand falling away, and he pulls something—what looks like a fancy cigarette case, although Jeremiah highly doubts that cigarettes are what’s inside—out of the inner pocket of his jacket.

“Do you smoke?”

Jeremiah would answer, but his tongue is glued to the roof of his mouth. 

“Nah, he’s just here for socialization,” Jerome says after a beat of silence and Jeremiah glares at him for it.

“It’s always nice to make new friends,” Bruce responds, glancing back up at Jeremiah with a smile, and Jeremiah is just as floored as when Bruce first turned around because _that smile is shooting him directly through the heart_. Bruce walks towards the others and Jeremiah dumbly follows after him, as if unable to stay away even though he certainly hadn’t planned on standing anywhere near Jerome or his stoner friends as they were smoking. To be honest he’d been planning to stand as far away as possible while keeping Jerome within eyesight. “If you ever do want to try just let me know. I’ve got some real good beginner-level stuff back home. Hybrid; low THC, I think it was maybe ten to fifteen percent?” He glances at Selina as he voices the questions aloud, and she nods at him. “And a higher CBD, a solid two percent.”

I have no idea what that means, Jeremiah thinks, and two percent sounds like a low percent, but you can tell me all about it if it means you’ll keep talking to me.

“It’d ease you right into it if you ever wanted to give it a try.” Bruce opens the cigarette case, pulling out a single joint of what looks to be half a dozen.

Who even needed so many joints on them at a time? Jeremiah would roll his eyes and scoff, but the answer to that question was evidently ‘the cutest boy I’ve ever met’, so he bites his tongue instead. 

“No pressure, though.” Bruce closes the case and tucks it back into his inner pocket, then casually hands the unlit joint to Selina before bringing a hand up to his hair, straightening out a few of the tousled waves. “I know a lot of people really aren’t into it.”

“I’ll think about it,” Jeremiah says, the first words that he’s managed to get out since catching sight of Bruce, even though he has been actively against the idea of smoking ever since Jerome started in their last year of high school. He pretends not to notice the way that Jerome’s eyes immediately snap onto him. 

Bruce flashes him another smile. Jeremiah feels himself melt.

“Cool.”

Cool. Yes. It’s very cool of me. Also, completely unrelated, are you into guys at all? 

Jerome flicks his lighter open and Selina leans in towards the flame, the end of the joint catching before she retreats, sucking in smoke in a way that had always made Jeremiah not-so-subtly sneer whenever he’d happened to catch sight of Jerome doing it.

Speaking of Jerome, he’s still looking at Jeremiah a little too intently for Jeremiah to feel comfortable. He’d flip him off, but he doesn’t want Bruce to realize that Jerome is staring at him since the reason behind why Jerome is looking at him as if he’s been replaced by a clone is because Jeremiah dislikes cannabis and barely tolerates Jerome’s use of it.

Jerome has called him a snob to his face and Jeremiah hasn’t cared, but if Bruce found out that Jeremiah’s opinion of pot-smokers wasn’t the greatest then he might not ever smile at Jeremiah again or talk to Jeremiah again, and that would be tragic. 

“Man, I am so glad that I introduced you and Ivy,” Selina comments, tilting her chin up as she exhales a stream of smoke. Jeremiah’s nose crinkles as the smell drifts over, but he manages to school his features when Jerome sends him a look that practically screams ‘if you don’t like it you can leave’. “You’ve got the space and money, she’s got the green thumb, and I reap the rewards.”

Bruce laughs softly as Selina passes off to Jerome, who finally breaks his unblinking stare in Jeremiah’s direction to glance Selina’s way, making idle chatter about classes as he brings the joint up to his lips. The pungent scent strengthens. Jeremiah stands his ground by crossing his arms and trying to look cool and not like he’s been judging Jerome for his life choices for the past few years or like he’s wondering what it would be like to run a hand through Bruce’s hair like his brother had. 

The joint is passed to Bruce, and Jeremiah feels foolishly jealous at the casual brushing of their fingers even before he is faced with the realization that Bruce’s lips are touching something that Jerome’s lips had touched, and that Jerome’s lips would touch it again. His gaze turns to the dead leaves at his feet, because if he looks at Bruce his expression is going to show _something_ and Jerome knows him way too well not to figure out what’s going on.

He darts glances up from underneath his lashes every now and again, mostly at Bruce but sometimes at his brother, who is unconcerned with Jeremiah’s usual silence. Bruce, on the other hand, nudges against him once, startling Jeremiah so badly that he nearly jumps.

“You okay? You’re pretty quiet.”

“I’m fine.”

Or maybe he was not fine, because if Bruce handed him the joint Jeremiah might tuck it into his mouth without inhaling, just to have his lips touch something that Bruce’s lips had touched. If Bruce offered to blow smoke into his mouth Jeremiah would probably take him up on it. 

Stars above. Bruce’s mouth hovering over his mouth. Bruce gazing at him through half-open eyes. Bruce close enough to breathe into him. Jeremiah thinks he could probably get over the smoke pretty quickly, especially if there was even the slightest chance of their lips touching—

Selina grinds something—the finished joint, Jeremiah belated realizes—under her boot as she and Jerome finish up their conversation. Bruce drifts over to the pair, and Jeremiah averts his eyes the moment that he sees Jerome fish his wallet out of his pocket. 

He stares up at mostly-bare tree branches, trying to come to terms with the fact that the cutest boy he’s ever met is selling his brother weed. He doesn’t drop his eyes until he hears the rustling of someone coming closer, and instead of his brother—who’s trying to ruffle Selina’s hair only to have her slap his hand away, though she’s smiling as she does it—it’s Bruce who’s approached him. 

Jeremiah swallows and tries not to look thunderstruck. 

“It was nice to meet you, Jeremiah. Come by anytime. Ivy’ll probably be here next week, though it’s hard to say because she generally likes plants more than people.” Bruce tucks his hands into his pockets and smiles. He looks very… Soft. Jeremiah’s fingers twitch as he once again wonders what it would be like to ruffle Bruce’s hair like Jerome had. 

“It was nice meeting you, too,” he says, “I usually have a class right now, though.” And he’s actually kind of upset about it. Then, because he really, genuinely hopes Bruce isn’t going to drive after smoking only to get into a terrible accident and die, he adds on, “I hope you’re not driving after this.”

Bruce blinks at him, startled, before he smiles again. 

“Oh, no. No. Don’t worry, I get picked up. Wait.” Bruce whips around to look at Jerome. “Are _you_ driving?”

“You smoked twice as much as me, Bruce, I’ll be fine.” Jerome reaches out to ruffle Bruce’s hair again, Jeremiah feels a stab of something like envy, and Bruce pouts up at him.

“I could give you guys a lift home. Alfred won’t mind.”

“But then I’d have to bus it back here for tomorrow morning, and I fucking hate the transit in this city.”

“Your morning class is at nine, isn’t it? I could give you a lift here, too. I start at ten but I don’t mind coming early.”

Jerome looks like he’s going to say no, which is of course what his fool-brother would do in response to a _kind offer_ from a _cute boy_ , so Jeremiah steps on Jerome’s foot and forces his way into the conversation.

“A drive home would be great, thank you.”

“Awesome,” Bruce says with a wide smile before he turns to Selina, nudging closer to her and laughing about something under his breath as they start heading out of the small clearing and onto the overgrown path. 

Jerome turns to him, expression flat for a few seconds before a smirk begins to crawl across his mouth.

“You have the hots for my dealer.”

“I believe you yourself said that he was _your friend_ , not _your dealer_ ,” Jeremiah responds, less snide than he’d frankly like to be. “And I don’t see why you have to make this a big deal. He’s cute, and sweet.” And probably perfect, if one just ignored the whole smoking-thing, which Jeremiah would be willing to do for someone _that_ cute. 

Jerome darts in closer, eyes sparking with something awfully mischievous. 

“You have the hots for Bruce. Fucking. _Wayne_.”

And that.

Well.

Jeremiah doesn’t know what he can possibly say to that other than;

“How the hell did you managed to become friends with _Bruce Wayne_?”

Jerome pats Jeremiah’s shoulder once, mockingly consoling. 

“By smoking with him, obviously.”


End file.
